Andraea Longstride
Andraea Longstride-Nevra was a bounty hunter during the Cold War. She is the oldest child of Jedi Azale Vrandel and sister to Republic trooper Sarah Longstride. Her father is unknown, though her mother has a short list of who it could be. She is a permanently contracted hunter for Lord Imixi Keshwan and acts as backup for Imperial agent Malminn Keshwan on occasions requiring visible firepower. She is still considered a top-ranked enforcer for Street Sweepers Security and acts as a member of the inner defensive ring for Nar Shaddaa's Nevra enclave. Biography Early Life Andraea was born in secret late one night in 3671 BBY in the Nevra clan enclave on Nar Shaddaa to Azale Vrandel, then Knight of the Jedi Order. Her name was given a week later after being exposed to a number of visiting clan Seers and Keepers; after solidly thumping one Seer on the nose and trying to bite three Keepers, there was little doubt in their minds who had been brought into the world again. While her mother had to attend to her duties, Andraea spent her first years within the confines of the enclave. There were no other births in her year, and few close to either side, so she often felt isolated even in the crowded city block that held the enclave. She found comfort and friendship with some of the older children that had already taken interests in the clan's master technicians, though she knew already that she would not stay quietly in the home block forever. At around four years old, Andraea started test-training with various weapons. As most had expected, she demonstrated a talent with small blasters and quickly picked up some skill with larger rifles. The teachers also noticed she started tucking a small knife down the side of her boot; it was a butter knife, thankfully, but a knife. As her dexterity improved, she was allowed to work with real knives and eventually small vibro-blades, though she quickly took a liking to punch blades mounted in bracers. When she wasn't being taught clan history and general necessary skills, she spent most of her time thrashing training dummies or working in the weight facilities in the training areas. She took a self-imposed break in her training when her little sister, Sarah Longstride, was born. Their mother managed to spend almost three solid years with them before she was forced to leave on Order business. While Andraea took great pains to take care of her little sister, the elders of the enclave finally proved to her that they would take responsibility for the toddler. With her mind at ease, she resumed her training in earnest. Gang Years At nine Andraea was allowed to begin running with the public front of the clan on Nar Shaddaa, the Street Sweepers Security gang. While only a runner at first, she quickly proved her combat capability and demonstrated a knack for quick thinking and oddly effective ideas. Much to her elders' relief, she proved she usually knew her own limits; as long as there wasn't someone else to be protected, she would turn and run for help if the situation was truly nasty. Andraea tried to take on a Hutt's forces when she was about ten; Sarah had been gifted to him to pay off a debt. After almost killing three of the Hutt's enforcers, much to his surprise, Andraea demanded her sister's return. It took several elders and her sister's own assurances to convince her to leave the situation alone; the debt contract was iron-clad and set at a short, fixed time frame. Still annoyed with the situation, Andraea spent the duration of the contract checking in on her sister almost every week and acting as the clan's/gang's assistant liaison to the Hutt. At almost fifteen, a few months after Sarah's service to the Hutt became more relaxed and she was allowed to spend time at home, Andraea heard a ruckus kick up at the edge of Sweeper territory. Charging around the corner, she found her sister in a shouting match with a Jedi Master. She would later find out that the Jedi had been trying to take the force-sensitive child of the woman who was cowering behind Sarah, but at the time all she saw was the Jedi push Sarah roughly out of the way; she tripped and Andraea watched her head impact a wall. Without thinking, which she initially thought allowed her success, Andraea pulled her blaster and shot the Jedi in the back. He was lucky to be wearing body armor under his robes, but the blast still staggered him momentarily and gave Sarah the chance get up and go for his knees. Witnesses reported the next few minutes were utter chaos; Andraea yelled for help as she charged at the Jedi, Sarah kept tripping him up and nearly caved his skull in with a passing mouse droid, he called for help which brought his padawan running, then that one tried to join the fight but another Sweeper had caught up by then and tackled her, then she called for help which brought another Master and her padawan running, but by then more Sweepers were coming in and those two were distracted by concentrated blaster fire. The only thing that prevented someone from getting killed was the arrival of one of the force-sensitive elders; he stopped the fighting by knocking all the combatants to the ground and holding them there until they stopped shouting. After allowing the Sweeper reinforcements up first and ordering them to back up, he slowly allowed the Jedi and the sisters to rise. Before any of the Jedi could speak, he stared them down and suggested they leave Sweeper territory immediately. The lead Jedi tried to protest, pointing out the force-sensitive child and the mark on his back where Andraea had shot him, but the elder would have none of it. He told them to leave immediately and there would be no trying Andraea for what she'd done. While visibly put out, the Jedi realized they were badly outnumbered (there were more Sweepers gathering, making it worse) and quickly left the territory. While she didn't get in trouble for what happened, Andraea suddenly found herself with what felt like excessive extra training. It wasn't long before one of the teachers pushed her too far during a practice bout and she threw him across the room. Fearing she may have hurt him, Andraea was confused when her teacher pulled himself up and told her he'd been waiting for her to let go and get angry. From that point forward Andraea received specialized training in working with her limited access to the Force, making her highly effective in close combat against stronger force users. It was during those deep-training years that Andraea got in a nasty fight with a rival gang that wanted to steal a large chunk of Sweeper territory. Earlier the same day she'd stocked up on emergency adrenals from a recently opened illegal chemist's shop. During a lull in the fighting when she'd managed to hide far enough ahead of the rival crew to catch her breath, she decided to use one of those adrenals to give her enough strength to get back into secure territory and get reinforcements. Moments after injecting herself, she knew something was wrong. Adrenals were nothing new to Andraea; everyone in the gang had had to use one at one time or another to save their skins. What was running through her veins burned like liquid fire and it felt as if her muscles were trying to tear their way out of her body. Her screams brought the enemy gangsters right to her, but a passing smuggler also heard and came running. Andraea only saw a blur of green and heard several large blasts before the gangsters took off running and she finally passed out from the pain. Three days later Andraea woke up in the medical wing of the enclave. The healers told her that she would survive without any lasting impairments to her movements as long as she started training again right away, but her reflexes would need extensive work to get her back up to where she had been. When she asked why, they explained the badly produced adrenal had done severe damage to parts of her nervous system. If she hadn't been brought in when she was, there was a good chance she would have been at least partially paralyzed. As it stood, her sense of touch would never be the same; while the healers had managed to save the important nerve clusters, those dedicated to sensation were largely destroyed. When she asked who'd brought her in, the healers simply told her to wait and see; her rescuer had been told she was awake and wanted to see her. A few hours later Andraea was being introduced to Vorili Frek, a clan smuggler and native of Nar Shaddaa who hadn't been able to come home for over a decade. The two became quick friends, despite their age difference. Republic Military Service At seventeen, mere months after being declared advanced-combat ready again and only days after receiving her clan tattoos, Andraea declared her intent to enlist in the Republic Military. While not surprised, the elders made her sufficiently defend her decision before sending her off with their blessings. It wasn't hard for her to find a recruiter, and within a month she was shipping off to the academy. At first Andraea had trouble dealing with the rigid authority and structure in the military, but she quickly learned to treat it as she'd treated the hierarchy in the Sweepers and other gangs. She scored high in most of her classes and was never in the bottom half otherwise, but she never put in the effort necessary to get to the top. She especially excelled in her combat classes, but forced herself to hold back enough to stay just out of the top slot and not end up killing one of her fellow cadets by accident. Her instructors became aware of her true abilities during a few incidents involving some less morally sound cadets and their female cohorts. During her second year at the Academy, Coruscant was attacked. Thrown into combat with a squad of second and third year cadets and led by a senior, Andraea demonstrated a thorough knowledge of street to street battle tactics nobody in the Academy had known she posessed and accidentally revealed a savagry in combat nobody but her instructors had suspected. Not a single member of her temporary squad was lost in the battle, though Andraea was severely injured several times and refused to stop until the battle was over. After the fighting finally ended, she found a slightly less bumpy patch of ground and promptly passed out. After she had recovered enough to walk without help, a review board made the decision to declare Andraea a graduate of the Academy. After leaving Coruscant, Andraea bounced around several assignments until settling down in a crew jokingly labeled Late Squad. She got along well with all four of her squad mates and came to truly respect her CO. The five-man squad worked like a well-oiled machine in the field and their CO kept the brass of their backs with some serious skill in writing clean mission reports. Andraea kept them supplied with barely legal armor modifications and implants; the other four never pressed her for her sources, but after the sixth time they had to help put out small electrical fires they figured out she made most of it and started calling her Sparky. She served with them for two years until an Imperial ship took them by surprise over an uninhabited moon and shot them down. While her CO was killed in the crash, the other three and Andraea survived. Taking charge as she'd never done before, she kept the four of them alive long enough to salvage enough parts to cobble together a distress beacon. Having purposefully decided not to keep track of time, the four survivors were surprised to find they'd been stranded for just over three months. After being rescued, the four survivors were allowed about a month's recovery time before being saddled with a new CO and sent off on a new assignment. Andraea hated the new guy, as did the other three, but none of them wanted a dishonorable discharge so they behaved themselves in public. Their new CO also carried the opinion that Andraea should perform "services" beyond standard military roles; she never obliged, and her CO tried to make life miserable because of it. He never fully succeeded, but there was always a lingering distrust between the four established troopers and the new guy. After a little over a year Andraea's squad was quietly sent to Balmorra. While officially "on leave," the five troopers still lived with a small contingent of other squads on a small base disguised as a dilapidated farmstead. After almost ten months, Late Squad was sent in to clear a small cave system of Colicoids in an attempt to secure a better location for their base. While they didn't find any of the bugs, they did find a small cavern full of Imperial troops. After taking them by surprise, Late squad demolished the enemy soldiers. They were surprised, though, by the appearance of a lone Sith warrior. Andraea was closest to the enemy and engaged immediately, giving her squad time to retreat back into the tunnels. Her CO threw a grenade into the middle of the fight, but the Sith tossed it back before it could go off and the resulting explosion took out the mouth of the tunnel, trapping Andraea inside with the enemy. After a long fight Andraea was badly injured, including a nasty laceration to her throat, but when the Sith took time to gloat she managed to put her punch-blade through the enemy's gut. Still unable to move, the Sith just laughed at her and turned to go, holding stomach wound to keep from bleeding out. Andraea had just enough strength left to throw a grenade, collapsing the opposite tunnel opening and trapping the Sith in with her. The first explosion had weakened the cave, though, and the whole thing came down on her and the Sith. The only thing that saved her was the strength of her personal shield. Andraea woke several days later to find herself being worked on by a Pureblood Sith male she'd never seen before. She couldn't move or speak clearly due to the damage done to her throat, but he calmly explained the situation, taking nods and grunts as her input. She was on the enemy Sith's ship, which freaked her out quite a bit, but when the male rolled up his sleeves she could clearly see the clan tattoos. He explained that the Sith she'd fought was an older Pureblood named Imixi Keshwan and that when he, along with some assistance, had dug the two of them out Imixi had insisted on taking her aboard. He told her that when he'd gotten her armor off and seen the tattoos, Imixi had nearly laughed herself sick and told him to heal her as best he could; it was the least she felt she could do for a clan member after nearly killing her. While Andraea digested this new information, the male introduced himself as Malminn Keshwan, a still in-training medical officer for Imperial Intelligence. After taking a few more days to heal, Andraea was able to speak and started asking questions. She was saddened to find she'd been declared KIA by the Republic, but unsurprised. Imixi had purposefully left behind a copy of her ID tags to be found, giving them the impression her body had been stolen by the Imperials. When asked if she would like to be returned to her fellows, Andraea said no. She knew her CO knew better than to throw a live grenade that close to her when she didn't have a helmet, so she could only assume he was hoping she would be injured or killed in the blast. She decided then and there to leave the Republic, but she didn't know what she could do otherwise. Imixi suggested she put her skills to use as a bounty hunter. Having no better ideas, Andraea agreed. She was only twenty three. Imperial Years Since then Andraea has spent her time making money as a bounty hunter. To get her foot in the door, Imixi announced herself as the younger woman's patron and vouched for her abilities. It didn't take too many jobs for Andraea to start getting her own reputation; she was firm on her contracts, never promised anything she couldn't deliver, and delivered exactly what was asked. She eventually started picking up jobs from Imperial Intelligence, other Sith, civilians, military personnel, and many others. About three years after her official "death" in the Republic, Andraea heard her CO had been killed while on patrol. When she contacted Sarah to ask about it, she simply confirmed her suspicions: after being assigned to Late Squad, Sarah had come to her own conclusions about her CO and waited for the opportunity to do something permanent. Andraea took her out for a few drinks since Sarah was on shore leave until the brass could find her a new posting, and the two made sure to keep in regular contact after that. Andraea ended up with her facial tattoo after a long night of drinking with her little sister; the two of them had been celebrating Sarah's assignment to Havoc Squad and had a few too many apiece, then one of them got a bright idea and they made their way to the nearest body mod shop. They woke up the next morning hung over and with new tattoos. Andraea thought it was hilarious and said so; she spent the next little while wrestling with Sarah. The two of them parted on friendly terms, and Andraea promised to pass along anything interesting she heard if she ended up hanging around Imperial brass. During a short stay on Dromund Kaas, Andraea overheard several spaceport workers talking about a group of force sensitives that were being shipped off to Korriban. Knowing how that usually ended, Andraea quickly tipped off her mother. She later found out that Azale had rounded up some help and intercepted the transport, rescuing several weaker force users and a handful that could make it as Jedi. She was introduced shortly after that to one of the rescued teens, Tsel'rati Nevra; Azale had taken her as a padawan and the young Twi'lek had asked to be brought into the clan. Andraea spends most of her downtime at home in the Nar Shaddaa enclave helping train younger Nevras. She also uses those opportunities to see Sarah and swap harmless intel with other clan members. She works jobs from various sources, but anything Imixi hires her for takes priority. Personality and Traits Powers and Abilities SWTOR Class and Spec Powertech, Advanced Prototype tree. Family *Azale Vrandel - Mother *Sarah Longstride - Sister *Kelin Vicor - Brother in law Category:Nevra Legacy Category:Imperial Characters Category:Longstride Family Category:Vrandel Family